Disclaimer: I do not own Tokyo Mew Mew because if I did, then Ryou and Ichigo would end up together instead of that stupid Masaya!

"Omg! I'm LATE AGAIN!" the red haired girl reminded herself. Ichigo was running late again to her one and only job. Yup it was going to be a typical day. Just as the teen burst in to the cute little café, Ryou was walking down the stairs.

"Baka Strawberry, why are you late AGAIN?"

"Sorry! Gomen…." Ichigo replied with her head down.

"It's been the 4th time this week! How are you going to explain this?" Ryou was in an extremely bad mood this particular morning.

"Gomen nasai…."

"There's no excuse, you'll just have to work later than usual today."

"But…but" Ichigo started to stutter. "I can't! I have a lot of homework today and….."

"It doesn't matter…you have NO excuses, ever since you and Masaya have broken up, you have nowhere to go after work."

Rettasu gasped at what Ryou had said. It had been a known fact that they had indeed broken up a few weeks ago, but it was a subject that pained Ichigo dearly and it was unspeakable among them, especially when Ichigo was around.

"Hai…" Ichigo responded and left the room to put on her uniform. Ryou stared after Ichigo and finally trudged back up the stairs.

There was a dead silence as the others remaining in the room finally realized what had happened. "Wow, Ryou-kun really is a bad mood this morning." Mint commented while everybody nodded in agreement.

"…Okay everybody back to work!" Keiichiro said with a smile. As he watched everybody go back to what they were doing, he went up the stairs that Ryou had come from all the while wondering what was bothering his partner.

As Keiichiro opened the door to the familiar room of his partner and good friend, he saw the blue eyed teen sitting on his bed. "I think you know why I'm here."

"…yeah and I don't want to talk about it."

"You should talk to her you know? If this continues, you'll end up hurting both yourself and her as well. You're pushing her away Ryou…."

"….Every time I see her, I just get so….I don't know…angry for no reason."

"That's your jealousy talking," replied Keiichiro.

"….They broke up a few weeks ago…"

"But you still see them together as an image in your head, and that image just won't go away. I guess that's why you always get so angry when you see her."

"I guess…"

CRASH! The sound of many plates was heard and then…"KEI-CHAN!" Pudding's voice was heard screaming from below. "RETTASU DROPPED A HALF MORE DOZEN OF PLATES!"

"Coming!" Keiichiro replied but before he left he told Ryou, "Just remember what I said."

Ryou merely nodded and flopped on to his bed and a few minutes later, the teen was fast asleep.

A few hours later…

"Ryou….Ryou! Wake up!" Keiichiro was shaking the said boy and attempting to wake him up. "Ryou! I'm going out to do some errands and everybody is gone except for Ichigo. Just….remember what I said ok? Ja ne!"

A few minutes later, Ryou finally got up to go downstairs. Wonder what the baka is doing now…Ryou thought to himself as he walked down to find the red haired teen sweeping the floor. "…..Hey."

"Hi…." Ichigo looked up and shyly replied.

"….Anou….I'm sorry about this morning." Ryou started to say.

"It's ok…"

"Uh…….ok. I have some stuff to do in the lab, so I'll just be in there." Ryou said as he pointed in the direction of the laboratory."

The two teens were found wandering the streets trying to decide what they wanted to eat for dinner. They had already tried 15 restaurants. Either they were too "fancy" for Ichigo or they were too shabby for Ryou. Ryou didn't want to eat seafood and Ichigo was not in the mood for Chinese.

"Ryouuuuuuuuu I'm HUNGRY….We've been wandering around for 2 hours…let's just go SOMEWHERE to eat….I'm starving." Ichigo whined apparently forgetting everything that Ryou had said that morning.

"Okay fine. The next restaurant we come upon, we'll go inside ok?"

"Hai!" Ichigo said with a smile.

5 minutes later they were standing in front of a shaggy looking building with a rackety sign outside saying 'SPECIAL OF THE DAY – Spaghetti with meatballs'

"Uh….well you DID say the next restaurant we come upon….so…….." Ichigo stifled a giggle while looking at Ryou; the thought that someone as rich as Ryou would go into a restaurant like that was pretty funny and amused the red haired girl.

Ryou tried to put on a serious face, "ahem…yeah I did say that, so let's go..."

As they walked through the door, the two teens could see an elevator up ahead with a sign that told them that the restaurant was on the second level. "Let's go up…hurry up Ryou!" Ichigo exclaimed eager to get some food.

They pressed the button for the elevator to arrive and stepped in it when the doors opened. "So…..how's school?" Ryou asked Ichigo for lack of topic once inside the elevator.

Ichigo was surprised that Ryou was actually trying to have a conversation with her. "Um…ok?"

"I see. So um….." Ryou was struggling to find a topic.

"Yeah?"

"Um….do you…."

"Yeah…do I what?"

"Do you…." Ryou was on the verge of asking her if she had anyone new she liked when all of a sudden there was a loud sound and the ground below them was shaking as if they had crashed. Finally, the lights went out and Ichigo's scream was heard.

"Omg Ryou! Where are you? Why did the lights turn off?" Followed by this, he could feel someone grabbing on to him very tightly.

"Daijobu. Daijobu. It's ok. I think that the elevator probably crashed or something."

Ichigo who was still clinging on to Ryou whispered, "I'm scared Ryou."

"It's okay; we'll just call for help." Ryou said as he reached for his cell phone.

Ichigo's eyes finally adjusted to the dark and could see Ryou dialing on the phone. After a few minutes, Ichigo could see a disappointed look upon Ryou's face. "What? What is it?"

"There's no connection in this elevator," Ryou replied lamely. After a few seconds, Ryou started to blush as he realized that Ichigo was still clinging on to him. "Hey Ichigo…"

"Yeah?"

"…..You're still clinging on to my arm…………" Ryou stated although he still had a slight blush in his cheeks.

"Oh! Gomen ne!" Ichigo backed away with a slight blush as well.

"So….now what?" Ichigo asked as she slid down to sit on the floor of the elevator. There was a silence and then…."I know!" exclaimed Ichigo as she stood up once again. "There should be people outside ne? So if we yell or bang the door, wouldn't someone hear us?"

"Baka Strawberry….we're probably stuck in between two floors and that's why we crashed. No one can hear us." Smirked Ryou.

"Oh yeah…that's true…..Guess we'll just have to wait for someone to find us then…" Ichigo quietly said as she sat back down. There was an awkward silence between them as Ryou joined Ichigo in sitting down as well. After a few minutes Ichigo spoke up. "Haha….we never did get to go eat at the 'next restaurant' like you said."

This irritated Ryou for some reason, "Are you saying that it's my fault that we didn't get to eat?"

"No that's not what I me-" Ichigo tried to explain.

"That it's also my fault that we're stuck in this elevator? And that out of everybody in the entire world, I'd be the last person you'd want to be stuck in an elevator with?" Ryou was getting angry again even though Ichigo had clearly not done anything wrong.

"No I never said that and –"

"And you'd rather be with Masaya than me right?" Ryou regretted what he had said as soon as the words left his mouth.

"I never said that……." Ichigo said so quietly that Ryou almost didn't hear it.

"I'm sorry, I didn't mean it and –"

Now it was Ichigo's turn to interrupt Ryou. "If you didn't mean it, then why'd you say it?"

"It's because…." As Ryou was scrambled to find a reason why, he remembered back to what Keiichiro had said that very morning. "That's your jealousy talking"

"Because what! Why do you have to be SO mean to me Ryou? I'm sick of it. You're always mean to me and not anyone else. I just don't get it. Sometimes you're nice and then a minute later you can be a big JERK!" Ichigo demanded.

"But you still see them together as an image in your head, and that image just won't go away. I guess that's why you always get so angry when you see her." Ryou could actually hear Keiichiro's voice in the background as Ichigo yelled at him.

"Him……..is….." Ryou was having a hard time telling Ichigo what was on his mind. "It's Masaya…" whispered the blue eyed teen looking down as though he was ashamed as to what he had just said.

"Hahaha stop kidding around Ryou. Why would you be jealous of…..Masaya?" Ichigo asked even though it sounded like she was afraid it would be the truth.

"I'm NOT kidding!" exclaimed the blonde boy as he stood up to talk to Ichigo directly. "I can't stand that he gets everything when I don't get anything at all!"

"Why would YOU be jealous of Masaya?" Ichigo repeated.

"Tch….What do you think?"

"I…..don't know…." Ichigo replied.

Ryou shrugged, "Never mind. It doesn't matter if you don't get it. I'm just…..hungry I guess. Do you have anything food with you?" Ryou had sensed the awkwardness and wanted to change the mood. I guess Strawberry is too much of a baka to understand what I was trying to say after all.

"Hmmm….I think I had something in my bag…." Ichigo murmured as she looked through her bag.

"I think I had a chocolate bar somewhere…" Ryou also said as he looked through the pockets of his jacket.

"Here! I found it!" Ryou and Ichigo said simultaneously. They had both pulled out their junkies from the bag and burst out laughing imagining how silly they looked on the floor of the elevator munching on their junk food.

For the rest of the evening they talked and ate like old buddies, as if the incident in the morning had never happened.

"Wow….it's getting very late." Ryou stated as he looked at his watch. It read 2:08 AM.

"So….what were you talking about before? About being jealous of Masaya?" Ichigo asked as she stifled a yawn.

"Oh…that? It was nothing." Ryou was surprised that Ichigo bought it up again.

"C'mon…you know you can tell me……." She said as she yawned again and rested her head on the blonde boy's shoulder.

"It's just that…….I like you." Ryou confessed but as he turned, he saw that the 'Strawberry' was fast asleep. Maybe it's better that you DIDN'T hear that….Ryou thought as he also drifted off to sleep.

The next morning…

"Hey kids! Wake up! WAKE UP!" Ryou felt someone shake him as he was in the midst of another dream. "WAKE UP YOU TWO!" When Ryou finally opened his eyes, he saw a man standing in front of him with the elevator door opened. "Ah you finally woke up. Gomen ne. The elevator here always breaks down for some reason, probably because it's getting old. We got the elevator up and running as soon as we found out that you two were trapped inside."

"Arigatou. Thank you." Ryou replied as he stood up. Next to him he could feel that Ichigo had stood up as well.

"But what we didn't understand was….why didn't you just use this…?" The man pointed to the space below the elevator buttons where an emergency phone was concealed. "The security guard said that he didn't get any warnings of help last night."

"Ooops…." Ichigo said sheepishly while Ryou remained in his 'cool' mode but deep down he was embarrassed as well.

"That was stupid of us." Ichigo said as the two teens walked back home. "We could have got out of there hours ago and did not have to stay in the elevator for the whole night.

"Yeah." Ryou replied.

"But it was fun to spend a whole night in an elevator with you Ryou, because we got to talk a lot more and I actually had fun." Ichigo said as she gave a smile to Ryou.

"Yeah…" Ryou didn't seem to be in the mood to say much.

"And I don't know what I would have done if I was stuck in the elevator by myself. I probably would have got very scary so thank you so much." Ichigo said with the same enthusiasm.

"I guess." Ryou said but he was thinking about something else as he watched the cute red haired girl. After spending the entire night with her, I wonder if anything will change between us when we are at the café. After all, we DID talk about a lot of things last night….but in the end she still isn't aware of my feelings towards her….and she probably never will.

Ryou was so lost in his thoughts that he almost didn't catch the sentence that Ichigo had just said. "And I NEVER would have found out who you like." Ichigo said shyly with a devilish smile.

"What?" Ryou questioned. "How would you know who I like…unless…."

"…unless I DID hear your answer before I fell asleep right?" Ichigo interrupted Ryou with the same smile on her face.

"You TRICKED me!" Ryou said as he chased the little girl down the street.

"You can't catch me!" taunted Ichigo as she stuck out her tongue at Ryou.

"ARGH I'm going to get you for TRICKING ME!" Ryou replied as he continued chasing the red haired down the road.

Finally the blonde teen caught the red haired teen and put his arms around the younger teen. "I'm not letting you go until you swear you will never trick me again!" Ryou exclaimed with Ichigo's back facing him.

"Fine. You can hold me forever then." Whispered Ichigo without even turning around to look at Ryou.

"What?" Ryou was afraid that he might have heard wrong.

"You told me who you like, but I never told you who I've admired." Ichigo whispered once more with the same tone.

"….Are you sure I want to know?" Ryou was still holding on to Ichigo.

"It's somebody that I've liked for awhile but I always hid it because I thought it was impossible. He was always so cold to me and he was nice to everybody but me. But whenever I looked into his blue eyes, I could see sadness and it just made me want to hug him so much, but yet every single day it seemed that he got more and more angry with me until I finally gave up…" Ichigo said softly.

Ryou didn't want to take any chances. "And this person would be…?" Ryou found himself whispering as well and his hold on Ichigo seemed to tighten due to his anxiety.

"It's you, Ryou." Ichigo turned around and Ryou didn't know what happened next but he found himself closing his eyes and felt something press against his lips. Without thinking, Ryou kissed Ichigo back. After awhile, they broke apart. "I love you Ichigo." Ryou whispered. "I love you too Ryou." Was the response from Ryou's beloved 'strawberry'.

End of Story.

Sakuya: X.x That was tiring….

Ryou: Hey at least I'm with my beloved strawberry :D

Sakuya: Shut up u.U Anyhoo….I'm sorry this came so late! It was supposed to be updated last weekend, but I was so busy with tests and homework that I kind of procrastinated on this! Gomen nasai!

Ryou: She has to take summer school because she's stupid :D

Sakuya: (Whaps Ryou on the head)

Ryou: OW! (now has bumps on his head)

Sakuya:D Yeah I'm taking summer school but not because I failed it. I'm taking it because I didn't take the course during the school year. It's like an advanced credit course….sort of…kind of :P

Ryou: I hate you. X.x

Sakuya: And I love you too :D Anyhoo it's time to go! Ryou….what did I teach you today?

Ryou: (Reads from paper) Read and review for more Ryou/Ichigo fluff! Because FLUFF IS GOOD! U.u

Sakuya: u.U" I guess that'll have to do. Please read and review for my first oneshot! Thank you!

The author would like to thank you for your continued support. Your review has been posted.